NEW DELHI: Former Supreme Court judge, Justice V R Krishna Iyer, has petitioned President K R Narayanan to commute into life imprisonment the death sentence slapped on four hardcore LTTE activists by the Tamil Nadu High Court and confirmed by the Supreme Court in the former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi's assassination case.

Though the review petition to stop the hanging is pending before the Supreme Court for hearing next Tuesday, Justice Krishna Iyer says his was "an appeal for preservation of life" of four young men based on the substantive judgment of the Court confirming the death sentence on the four.

He wants the President to "exercise that extra-ordinary compassionate authority vested in you to commute a death sentence into a life term" and stressed that he should do so "in the name of the spirit of Mahatma Gandhi."

The President is a known friend of the Gandhi family and as such he finds himself in an awkward position being asked to show mercy to the murderers of Rajiv Gandhi. He is also not able to flung aside a strong recommendation coming from a former Supreme Court judge who has an international reputation as a human right activist and who had himself sat in judgment on such heinous crimes once upon a time.

The Rashtrapati Bhawan sources said Justice Krishna Iyer's petition of July 29 has been forwarded to the Home Ministry for its comments. Unless the Supreme Court itself stays or revises the death sentences at the review hearing fixed on Tuesday, the President cannot put off the decision until the formation of the new government after elections. If the Court rejects the review petition, the hanging may be fixed coming Thursday or the next Thursday. (Hangings are generally on Thursdays.)

In his appeal, Justice Krishna Iyer says "perhaps what is horrible has happened and Shri Rajiv Gandhi's life has been extinguished by a barbaric act." He stressed that he does "not condone the crime but, be it ever so violent, nothing is gained by adding to the number of killings even if life is taken by the legitimacy of the law."

"Every dawn when a human is hanged, the flag of humanism flies half-mast! Humanity in its finer mood, expresses its shock at adding to the number of deaths by judicial sanction," writes the former judge.

He says: "In the present case, it is clear that the persons are young, their motive is focused on one person, the victim was a great person. … It is obvious that the killers were acting under duress beyond their control. It was not instictive malignancy under operational pressure of a violent leader that has constrained the murderers to commit what they did."

"These extenuating factors in my humble view, warrant the commutation I plead for, in the name of the spirit of Mahatma Gandhi and the compassion which the Constitution (Article 51A) makes as a fundamental duty of every Indian. In these circumstances I urge our exalted Rashtrapati to exercise your clemency and preserve the breath of life in these souls which are still alive," pleads Justice Krishna Iyer.

He stresses that "conscience of humanity will recognise, as many countries have already done away with, depravation of life, even pursuant to a judicial sentence, does not reduce the inhumanity of the result."

He points out that while as the Home Minister of Kerala and later as a judge of the Supreme Court, he had always taken the view that "whatever the constitutionality of the death sentence may be, its imposition must be limited to the rarest of rare cases or must be treated as abolished for all practical purposes." He says he had expressed himself in two cases of brutal murder that the death sentences should not be imposed on the culprits."

The former judge also draws the President's attention to the fact that may countries, including the United Kingdom and South Africa, had abolished death sentence. "The second Optional Protocol passed by the United Nations also abolishes death penalty, although India had not ratified nor opposed it." END.